April 2009

Making luft and counterattacking
simultaneously.
25. …Qxc2
Donaldson played this quickly, which
surprised me because 25....Bxh3 seemed
worthy of deep consideration.
Threatening a knight fork.
31. Qd3 Qf6 32. Rxa5
My last two moves were based on a
miscalculation.
26. Qd4+!
I think maybe he missed this idea.
26. …Kg8
The point is that 26. ...Kf8 is strongly
met by 27. Re1 when White is guarding the
back rank, attacking the bishop, and
threatening mate on h8.
27. hxg4 Qc1+ 28. Nf1 Qg5 29. Ra7
Here I felt that objectively White is
winning. However I was already in time
trouble, and Donaldson was getting close to
joining me, so the result of the game was
still up in the air.
32. …Qxb2 33. Qa6 Qe5
Here it is; For some reason I had only
been looking at 33...Rd8 34.Qb6 or 33...Qf6
34. Rb5.
34. Qd3
Being objective and trying to get my
queen back into play, however Black now
has the initiative.
34. …Rc3 35. Qd2 Nc4
I think at this point I had below 5 minutes
and Donaldson below 10. White is still up
a pawn, but things have become messy.
38. …Rc1 39. Qf8+
I think Qh8 is objectively stronger, but
here I saw I could do no worse than draw
the game.
39. …Kf6 40. Ra6+ Kg5 41. Qe7+
29. …Qd8 30. g3
I need to avoid 30. Ne3 Rc1+ 31. Kh2
Qh4#
30. ...b4
36. Ra8+ Kg7 37. Qf4 Qxd5 38. Qb8!
Giving back the material to make threats
against Black’s king. Now the game reaches
its climax.
41. ...Kxg4
41. ...Kh6 is what I was anticipating,
when I was hurriedly looking to see if there
was anything better than a repetition with
42.Qf8, etc. I think it’s possible that
Donaldson, trying to take advantage of my
time trouble, had only calculated 42. Qe2
and simply missed my next move.
42. Qh4+
Black stopped the clock, and shook my
hand.
1-0
Page 8 Northwest Chess April 2009